Creation began on 03-20-20
Creation ended on 07-14-20
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Welcome to your Escape: Battle against Defeat
A/N: The polls are closed, and the results are in. Here's the outcome.
"I can't believe we're doing it this way," went Geisha as she and Nico sat inside the latter's Gustav as they pulled the Liger Rogue and Gun Sniper behind them towards the battlefield where the Judge would crash and designate the area.
"It was a last-minute decision, but nobody challenged it," Nico told her, looking at her GPS locator in front of her behind the steering wheel, seeing that Valerie's Geno Saurer was keeping a steady pace behind them. "Are you afraid that your ex is going to prevail against Shinji, Drake and Valerie because of his Gungyalado?"
"I'd be lying if I said I wasn't. It's not that I don't have faith in our team, but this is a lot of pressure for Drake and his Gun Sniper."
Nico sighed and understood where Geisha's concern was coming from; because the Gun Sniper wasn't getting any better in its performance due to its age, Drake would have to be extra careful if he wanted to preserve it for as long as he could. Switching on a camera on the second trailer the Gun Sniper was on, she took a long look at the hand-me-down Zoid and thought of the idea of it facing off against the Gungyalado, which ended up not even being a contest. Then, she pressed a button to turn on the intercom between her Gustav and Drake's Gun Sniper.
"How are you doing up there, Drake?" She asked him.
"Runnin' on sunshine, Nico," he responded.
"Any chance you want to back out?"
"No, that'd mark my conscience as a weakling because I backed out of a challenge that I chose to participate in. What kind of example would I be setting if I did that?"
"No offense, Drake," went Geisha to him, "but if we lose this match, I will be yelling at you."
"None taken, Geisha."
Crash! Nico looked up ahead and saw the crash site where the Judge would be located.
"Well, this is," she sighed. "We can't turn back now."
"Yeah," Geisha agreed with her.
The Gustav stopped and twenty seconds later, the Liger Rogue and the Gun Sniper got off the trailers to join the Geno Saurer.
"Everyone, be careful out there," Nico instructed the three pilots, "and best of luck."
"We're going to need it and skill," said Valerie as she took notice of the two König Wolves and the Gungyalado. "I'm glad those Zoids ain't mine, because we're going to send them to the repair shop after this."
"I'm all for it," went Shinji.
-x-
"Oh, you gotta be kidding me," went Shigeru as he and Hyuga were about to watch the Zoid battle between the Clover Team and the Yeagerist Team. "That Gun Sniper looks like it's about to go to its grave fighting."
"Yeah, but look at that Zoid they're going up against," Hyuga pointed out to the picture of the Gungyalado. "That thing's a monster."
"Looks like they're going down the firepower route."
"Hey, did you hear?" They heard Maya ask them as she ran down the hall to meet them. "A new Zoid match is about to happen."
"Oh, my gosh, look at this Zoid they're going up against."
"It's a monster."
"Ready… Fight!" The voice of the Judge announced, and the battle began.
-x-
Shinji went left, Valerie went right, and Drake just fired rockets at Spinel's Gungyalado.
"I swear, you've set your standards quite low, Geisha," they heard Spinel's voice on the intercom, addressing the only combatant on the Clover Team that wasn't competing right now. "You used to be such a daring person."
Is he really trying to talk to Geisha during a Zoid match? Nico wondered as she turned to face Geisha in her Gustav, who seemed disgusted.
"Less talking to me, more facing your opponents," she heard her say to him, and then cut off his connection to the communication channel. "I really don't wanna talk about it."
"The sounds of a man still pining for who he claims to care about," Nico told her. "Personally, I rather he focus on the match, too."
On her screen, Nico watched as Shinji engaged a König Wolf with a large cannon on its back. It was identified as a miniaturized Buster Cannon, a rather powerful weapon designed for the obsolete Gojulas Zoid.
"Oh, you gotta be kidding me!" Nico gasped, and then opened her channel to Shinji's Liger Rogue. "Shinji, be careful! That's a miniaturized Buster Cannon from the Gojulas series! It makes regular cannons on smaller Zoids look like water guns or slingshots."
"I see it," Shinji responded, keeping at a distance. "I'll take that König Wolf out before it can get a chance to take out Rogue."
"Rrraurgh!" Liger Rogue roared as it ran across the field towards the König Wolf that was aiming its cannon at it. "Rrraurgh!"
Meanwhile, Valerie and her Geno Saurer were facing off against the other König Wolf, which was armed with a cache of rockets on its back.
"Just for the record," Valerie told the pilot of the König Wolf, "I've dealt with missiles before. I was eight when I learned to avoid them. Old habits die hard."
"So you say," the guy piloting the wolf Zoid responded. "Were you trained to be an assassin or something? Were your parents perfectionists that spared no expense trying to breed the perfect daughter in an unstable world?"
Valerie engaged the Charged Particle Gun and Buster Claws.
"No," she answered coldly, "they were just a pair of losers that pushed me away without even trying to justify their actions."
BLAST! Her Geno Saurer fired, and the König Wolf activated an Energy Shield…and ended up getting knocked eight feet backwards.
"Ouch," the guy groaned.
"Valerie, I think you overdid it," Nico told her.
"Uh, oops?" Valerie responded.
"Well, he got beat before he get fight, so that's one down, two to go," Geisha expressed.
-x-
"…That Valerie Axiom woman just cuts to the chase," one of the NERV employees expressed, watching as the enemy Zoid pilot's Zoid just fell out of action.
"Yeah," another employee accepted.
But Fuyutsuki watched on his tablet as Shinji and Liger Rogue just narrowly evaded an energy blast from the other wolf Zoid by leaping into the air, its claws surging with energy.
"Strike Laser Claw?" He wondered as he saw the liger Zoid tackle the wolf, tearing a major gash in the right side. "Whoa… Talk about a major break."
The König Wolf fell to its side and was unable to get up, probably due to the cannon on its back.
"Ikari's kid bagged another sweet win," he heard one of the personnel say.
-x-
Drake's Gun Sniper had just run out of rockets and missiles to fire…and the Gungyalado emerged from the smoke like a demon emerging from the depths of Hell.
"Did you honestly think that antique was a match for me?!" Spinel asked him over the intercom. "Gun Snipers are obsolete! Nothing more than relics from a time where people thought the best Zoids had to be better than the other person's Zoid!"
Then, he saw the enemy Zoid prepare to charge its Charged Particle Gun.
"Oh, damn," Drake sighed, and used his gatling guns to try and damage the Gungyalado, only to see the beams fired bounce off its armor.
"I'm sending your Zoid to the scrapyard!" Spinel yelled, and the CPG fired!
"Oh!" Drake gasped, trying to run and avoid the beam that would total his Gun Sniper. "Move, move, move!"
The beam struck the ground and sent chunks of earth into the air trying to hit the antique velociraptor Zoid.
"You can't run forever, you know!"
"I don't need to run forever! Just long enough to win this battle!"
"You do realize that we're not being timed here."
"Whoever said anything about being timed?"
Crack! The Gun Sniper's left leg gave out and Drake fell to the ground.
"Oh, no," he gasped, realizing that he had put too much pressure on the legs and they couldn't take it any further. "Oh, no, oh, no, oh, no!"
The particle beam struck his Gun Sniper…and the Clover Team was down a Zoid.
"Nothing more than a relic from an obsolete time," Spinel declared.
Inside his cockpit, Drake, feeling the gash on the right side of his head, looked down at the status screen in front of him and found his Gun Sniper had too many places where damage was critical. There was loss of function in the legs and arms, heavy loss of armaments and an update on the core showing that it had become compromised.
"Drake!" He heard Nico's voice. "Drake, come in! Are you alright?!"
"Ah…just a little banged up," he responded, "but my Gun Sniper's had it. Joints and weapons are heavily damaged and the core is compromised. I really let my grandmother down, trashing her Zoid. Unable to continue the match."
"You haven't let us down yet, Drake," he heard Shinji say. "Valerie and I got this."
Spinel turned his Gungyalado around…and saw that Liger Rogue tackle it to the ground.
"What?!" He gasped, trying to get the liger off. "No!"
He managed to knock it off and get back up, looking down upon the Zoid.
"Don't you newbies ever learn not to overestimate your abilities?" He questioned.
"Yeah," he heard Shinji say to him, "we do."
BLAST! Spinel's Gungyalado was suddenly struck from behind…by another particle beam, right through the back and out the front of its waist, cracking the wings and causing it to fall to the ground.
"You underestimated the power of teamwork, Spinel," Valerie's voice uttered through the intercom. "You take out one of ours…and you better expect the rest to exact payback."
"Battle over," the Judge declared. "The winner is the Clover Team!"
-x-
"They won again," went Misato as she and Ritsuko were watching the broadcast of the Zoid battle that Shinji was involved.
"And they bested a Zoid armed with an energy weapon that was more powerful than the one Ms. Axiom's Geno Saurer has," Ritsuko expressed, more impressed by the energy weapon than the Zoids themselves.
"But they lost one of their Zoids in the process," Asuka reminded them, seeing that the Gun Sniper was too damaged. "They probably gotta throw that one away."
-x-
The drive back to the hangar was silent in Nico's Gustav. After the match was over, Drake's Gun Sniper finally bit the dust and fossilized, dying after being alive for so long.
Someone wanted to speak up to Drake, but they didn't know what to say to him. This had been Shinji's first time seeing a Zoid die, so he wasn't sure how to speak to Drake about how it felt losing a Zoid you had been around for a long time. Not even Geisha or Valerie knew how to address him on this.
"How are you holding up, Drake?" Nico finally broke the silence.
"It hurts a lot," he responded, "but I'm forever grateful to Leena's Gun Sniper. At least now she's able to continue pulverizing her rivals with it in the next world."
Beep! Drake reached into his pants and pulled out a disc-shaped device.
He tapped on it and it lit up with green light, revealing a woman's face.
"Hey, Mom," he greeted the woman.
"I heard you won the last match," they all heard her say to him. "How are you feeling?"
"Just a minor head injury. My Gun Sniper fell in the last match, though."
"Did it go out fighting or did it go out silently?"
"Honestly, it kinda went out doing both, fighting silently."
"It'll be a while before we can send you a new Zoid."
"Take your time, Mother. As of now, I'm on the mend. I'll be helping the team from the sidelines. I'm still involved, just not combating."
"Heh-heh. Okay, Drake. You take care."
The chat ended then and Drake looked at everyone in the Gustav.
"What?" He asked them. "I still know maintenance with other Zoids."
Geisha just chuckled and said, "When I see your next Zoid, I hope it's just like you: Enduring."
"Had any ideas on what your next Zoid will be, Drake?" Nico asked him.
"No, but I'll get to that point, eventually," he answered.
To be continued…
A/N: The Clover Team won, but they lost the Gun Sniper, and it'll be a while before Drake gets a new Zoid. It's anyone's guess at what it'll be.